No, I haven't abandoned DA. 2008 was just a very busy year for me, and it was all mostly good. I got a good job last Summer that's only a five minute drive away. I make gourmet goat cheese and I really like it; before anyone asks, I don't have to milk goats, we buy our milk from local goat farmers. In the months since I got this job, I've made myself quite a valuable member of the crew, so I feel reasonably secure financialy. Besides the much needed and appreciated cash, the job gives me lots of time to think alone, which is quite nice.

As you probably noticed, I've added a few new pieces to my gallery here, something I've been meaning to do for quite some time. Hopefully I'll be able to post new pieces and journal entries more regularly this year.

As you may have noticed, I've uploaded some new stuff! I know I haven't in a while, so I decided to rectify that. So I posted a cityscape painting featuring a giant robot, two ceramic Storyteller figure sets and a charchol drawing of an abandoned hornet's nest. All but the painting are, well, not exactly new material. The Storytellers are nearly ten years old now. I just felt like posting them. They're new to YOU anyway! lol!

I do have new stuff in the pipeline still. One BIG Halloween project which is nearly done and I should have posted in the next week... maybe. The other project is another sword which may also be done in a week. The sword might have been done this week, but it's been rainy so I stopped work on it cause I'm just about ready to start spraypainting it's components and I can't do that in the rain.

Also: the Doctor Who Season Finale fricken' rocked! But then, the good Doctor rarely disapoints!

You may have noticed I haven't posted anything lately. I want to assure you I haven't abandoned DA, it's just that I've been very busy lately. Those of you who keep an eye on my little corner of the DA Universe know that I'm a Sci-Fi Geek and artist with a universe in his head. But what you may not know is that that's only half of my life because I have another occupation that you might not expect: I'm a farmer. Specifically, I'm a fourth-generation blueberry farmer...

It all began in the 1890s when a young man by the name of Klaus emmigrated from Finland to the United States, specifically central Massachusetts. Eventually he bought an old farm in 1919, the farm I still live on today. Back then we just had wild, high-bush blueberries, but our berries were well known under the Bay State Blueberries brand which was sold daily at Faneuil Hall in Boston (when the berries were in season, of course). His son Andrew took over the business in the early 1940s, renamed it Blueberry Hill Farm and planted over 5000 cultivated high-bush blueberry bushes (cultivated bushes produce more berries and are easier to maintain than wild varieties). He also changed the way we sold the berries; no longer would we pick them and then truck them to Boston, we would now be a pick-your-own-berries farm. Those changes proved to be successful for the next thirty years. We were open seven days a week and many would come from far and wide to pick berries here.

My father Wayne took over the business after Andrew died in the 1970s and did his best to keep the business going. But times were changing and our customers were growing older. By the late 1980s, our loyal customer base began to dwindle as they began to grow frail and pass away. Their children and grandchildren didn't care to pay a little to pick their own high-quality berries, they'd rather pay a whole lot for inferior berries in a super market. By 1992 my Dad's efforts to attract new customers was failing and he was tired of trying so he closed up official opperations. In the spring of 1998 my Dad died after a two year struggle with Lymphoma Cancer. He had been depressed since I was a child and I was depressed to (Depression seems to have a genetic aspect to it, I've done research on it and various conditions and what not, but I digress), more-so after his death. I went to a community college, majoring in art, but I always wanted to revive the blueberry business and restore the farm to it's former glory some day. I made a few attempts, both with some help from a good friend and on my own, but things looked bleak, the project had gotten just way, WAY too big to handle entirely on my own, even with a little help from a friend. My Dad was just one man and he *just* managed to keep things up, but after and even before we closed, trees and vines and weeds had begun to infiltrate the rows of bushes and the nearby hay fields.

Flash forword to the Summer of 2007. We've had some financial problems and It was time to do something, either pull-up stakes and sell-out or try and make this farm work again so we could afford to stay here. I was really depressed at the prospect of leaving behind all we and my forebears had worked hard to keep and build upon for all these years. I would lose a great resource and the source of much of my inspiration and strength. My small but growing kadre of friends then offered to help in exchange for free blueberries. I agreed and now I have hope again.

That hope has been a powerful motivator. On my own, I might have been able to restore the farm by maybe 2017, if then. But now, with the help of my friends, we might just be able to pull it off in two to three years. To realize my dreams amongst the stars I've always known I'd need a solid foundation, but I wasn't sure how to do it. I thought for a while the answer was to restore the Studio my Dad built, but that will require more money than restoring the farm will take. So now I know, now I have a plan and I'm putting that plan into action.

The Restoration will take place in three, possibly four phases spaced out over the next two to three years. This fall the goal is to restore the infrastructure necessary to restore the rows of blueberry bushes themselves. This includes the roads, the parking lot field, the picnic area and the area surrounding the bushes. Hopefully my friends and I can get Phase-1 done this fall so Phase-2, where we prune the bushes and remove the trees, can begin early next spring. Currently I'm working on the roads by myself, but we've set a date for a weekend-long brush-clearing party in mid-October. I've gotten a lot done on the roads though and hope to have the main road mostly done before the brush clearing party.

As you can see, I have a lot to do. This doesn't mean I won't be doing any art projects, far from it. I need to be creative, it rejuvinates me and keeps me motivated. In fact, I've been doing a great deal of thinking about what will come in Phase-3, which goes beyond restoring bushes and fields and into building something entirely new. But what is it? Well, you'll just have to stay tuned In the meantime, I am working on a few art projects. All I'll say now is that both are connected to Halloween and that one is rather large I hope to have at least the big one posted in the next few weeks. I'll see about posting some other stuff between now and then though.

lol, I didn't really mean to write that much. Oh well, hope it isn't too boring. I don't promise that future postings will be shorter, but I'll try.

As you may have already noticed, I've put up the three prop weapons I was working on as well as a small piece of prototype armor. I always like making real-life representations of the stuff in my head, it forces you to think a lot more practically, I think. Take the shoulder armor; the original design called for it being twice the size I eventually pared it down to (about six-inches long, five inches wide now), however it would have limitted arm movement and been uncomfortable. And the sword's hilt I had to re-think as my pen & ink designs just weren't going to work.

I look forword to making new props and costume items in the future. I've got a third of a sheet metal replica Witch King armor set I made for a friend in the fall of 2005, with his and his wife's help. Since we had limitted time, I wasn't able to properly finish the set, but I was able to get the helmet and gauntlets made (and some make-shift shin and foot guards, but they've kinda broken appart since I built them as they weren't very sturdy). I may post a pic of the helmet itself soon and then, once complete post the the full armor set later on.

I know, I haven't uploaded anything in a while but I've been rather busy with various projects lately. The biggest project thus-far has been the moving of the Multiverse FFRPG from Delphi Forums to our own forums on a phpbb. In years past, we've been beholden to outside forces. Either vague, uncaring Admin that wouldn't mind to see us go (and we did), or a vague corporate entity that's made their forums vastly different, ie: worse and more expensive, over the years. Now we're independant on forums and sites created by us and run entirely by us. You can check out our new diggs here...

[link]

Feel free to join us if you like. We're just getting started writing again and the OOC "Dispatch Area" is abuzz with chit-chat.

As for artwork, I've got several projects in the pipeline I'll be posting as soon as they're completed.